Sharing diagnostic report

Sounds like you've done the right thing.  They may have had the best of intentions but my experience of HR is that a lot of people don't know what they are doing or are blindly following instructions from higher up.  Also, HR departments are primarily there to protect the employer rather than the employee.

As others have said too, I'd politely explain that some of the content is sensitive and provide the minimum,  maybe just the summary if you have to.

Thank you all for your sage advice - it is massively helpful to have the support of this forum and a sounding-board!

On consideration, I replied to HR stating that the diagnostic document contained personal and confidential information that was not pertinent to my work. I had already sent them a covering letter from the diagnostic team, as well as a detailed account of the challenges I face at work and some reasonable adjustments that might help support me in my role. I asked them which specific details they required from the report. I'll wait and see what they come back with. I am conscious that our HR team do not have the best track record in terms of knowledge or competence, so figure this is more to do with them bumbling rather than anything below board!

Thanks again,

RnR

I think either a polite refusal or a heavily redacted copy is the way to go. HR are just covering their ass in case you have a dispute later. If it is anything like my employer they will try to find all sorts of reasons not to give you adjustments. I am 2 years down the line with my career in tatters. It is now at director level for answers.

I wish you all the best and hope you get what you asked for.

As has been quoted below "there is no legal requirement to prove"...

With or without proof of diagnosis you have made your employer aware of your "disability" and that's all you have to do to request adjustments.

My employer outsources to an Occupational Health company who do their own assessment and do ask for sight of medical records. They keep this confidential and do not send medical evidence to my employer. I have shared my records with Occ Health, but would never give them to my employer direct.

I'd echo the advice to speak to the union if you can. You could also ask if they have a third party occupational health company that could be the "middleman" here if they are being insistent about seeing "proof". Might act to soften a refusal and demonstrate good faith.

I'm personally uncomfortable with any employer who sees reasonable adjustments as something that you have to "earn" by proving you "deserve" them. The whole idea is to help you to be able to do the job effectively and help them get the best out of their employee. Adjustments aren't "perks" and usually aren't difficult or expensive for the employer - hence the word "reasonable". My brain would be whirring away wondering if they're trying to wriggle out of their legal obligations and if so why. I might be on a worst case scenario there, but I am a little paranoid about HR in general. They are not medical professionals and won't fully understand the contents of the report anyway, so why ask to see it?

Doctor-patient confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical practise. Anyone, other than the police in investigating a crime, wishing to break this confidentiality are acting very dubiously. It could easily be argued that in relation to autism, which is classed for legal purposes as a disability, such a request verges on discrimination. Personally, if asked by an employer, I would consult my union and have a union representative sit in on any meeting. I think that a copy of the diagnosis 'front page', giving essentially just your name and the diagnosis of ASD, would be all I would agree to reveal.

I had two sent through, a full one and a abridged version which obviously just the broad strokes. So I think a redacted version would be a really good idea.

This is where I would strongly advise reaching out to your trade union. If you're not a union member, find out which union covers the employment sector/workplace you are in and join. Having a union representative often makes it far easier to negotiate this stuff. Frankly, it also means that employers have a more difficult time in asking for things they don't necessarily have a right to access. 

I told my employer 3 weeks ago.  Apparently someone was going to contact me, well not heard since then, so for the moment am leaving it.

I'm only figuring stuff out (diagnosed last month) , starting therapy this week and just reached out to local support group.  I've not made any requests for adjustments. When/if I do ask for adjustment and they want to see the report - I would ONLY give them the front page of the report with my diagnosis, the rest is very personal and not for their eyes at all.

I think the redacted copy sounds perfect. I’m not working now and only recently diagnosed, but I definitely wouldn’t have allowed my old employers to see my full autism diagnosis report. I too have things in mine that I wouldn’t want to share. To add to Bunny’s useful information, you could keep the NAS information handy to forward on to your employers if they aren’t happy with the redacted diagnosis. 

If there continues to be a problem, you could ask your GP to provide a summary of the relevant report for your employers. There may be a charge for this but your employers might pay for it.

Of course, we can’t provide legal advice here, but you might find this resource helpful:

Employment Autism - Providing evidence of autism

It includes, with underlining adeed by me:

“there is no legal requirement to prove this”

And:

”providing medical evidence of your autism may be helpful when asking for reasonable adjustments to be made both when applying for jobs and whilst in work“

I would suggest doing as you have said, and creating a redacted copy that shows them anything that you feel comfortable sharing and, most importantly, at least part of the section where it confirms the positive ASD diagnosis. Again, I should stress that this is personal opinion and preference.

There’s also some related advice here, including links to further resources:

NAS - Deciding whether to tell employers you are autistic

NAS - What are reasonable adjustments and when can they be requested?